Aleutian Internment and the Battle for Alaska

Aleutian American woman and children prepare to leave Dutch Harbor, Alaska for internment camps in 1942. Courtesy of the National Archives and Records Administration.

Many people are familiar with the topic of wartime Japanese American confinement on the Home Front that is featured in The National WWII Museum’s special exhibit, From Barbed Wire to Battlefields: Japanese American Experiences in WWII. Yet very few people think of the frozen islands of the Aleutians as a place of evacuation and battle. From June 1942 until August 1943, the Alaskan islands of Attu and Kiska were the site of fighting between the Allies and the Japanese, as well as the location of governmental round-ups of Native Alaskans who were then sent to camps in the Alaskan interior. Why were these people evacuated and why has it taken so long for their story to be told? How is their experience of confinement similar to and different from that of Japanese Americans on the U.S. mainland?

Aleutian American woman and children prepare to leave Dutch Harbor, Alaska for internment camps in 1942. Courtesy of the National Archives and Records Administration.

"Outlined Against the Cloudy Cloak of Snow-Capped Gareloi Volcano, a Naval Air Transport Flies through the Aleutians Towards Bleak Attu, October 1943." U.S. Navy Official photograph, Gift of Charles Ives, from the collection of The National WWII Museum. 2011.102.347.

Aboard the USS Delarof, residents of St. Paul, Alaska gaze back at their homes en route to internment camps in Southeast Alaska. 1942. Courtesy of the National Archives and Records Administration.

Aleutian American family in a U.S. internment camp, 1940s. Courtesy of the National Archives and Records Administration.

CONNECT:

The National WWII Museum tells the story of the American Experience in the war that changed the world - why it was fought, how it was won, and what it means today - so that all generations will understand the price of freedom and be inspired by what they learn.